


Strays

by sassyericawithaflowercrown



Category: Teen Wolf (TV)
Genre: Alternate Universe, Angst, Angst with a Happy Ending, Depression, Gen, Mild dubious consent to Bite, Pack Dynamics, Read warning, Suicidal Thoughts, Suicide Attempt
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-10-02
Updated: 2013-10-02
Packaged: 2017-12-28 04:44:37
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,468
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/987803
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/sassyericawithaflowercrown/pseuds/sassyericawithaflowercrown
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Erica grew up alone. Half on accident-- her mother leaving when she was nine and her father absent most of the time-- and half on purpose. People couldn't be trusted to not hurt you and in school she was just a pariah. Once she started college she didn't bother with friends or much of anything, allowing depression to take over her life and drive her towards the edge. Until something pulled her back.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Strays

**Author's Note:**

> Here is an fic I wrote because I've been having a really shitty week and this idea came to me when I was driving home. So I guess it's sort of a vent fic? Un-beta'd so let me know if theres any really awful errors and I'll clear them up. I do apologize for my typing errors and things. Hopefully MSWord didn't autocorrect any of the names :I I feel like it might have.
> 
> PLEASE PLEASE PLEASE Read the end note and take the Suicidal thought/suicide attempt tags VERY seriously. If those are going to be triggering-- DO NOT READ. The beginning of the fic is fulled with a lot of angst okay?
> 
> Kind of rushed the end and as far as what's canon? Pretty much all of it minus Erica getting bit and dying. And Boyd didn't die obviously.
> 
> ALSO; ahahahah -sweats nervously- I know I need to update That was That and White Washed. I'm working on That was That actually and I have a few dark month prompts. This was really just a random I say down an wrote for three hours without a break type deal. I've been having a block so I wanted to get something out.

When Erica was fifteen she found a stray cat.

She had been on her way home from school, walking because the bell didn’t ring for another three hours. When you were in out of the nurse’s office almost daily and in and out of the hospital frequently all you really had to do was give the front security officer a sad look and he would let you keep walking. Or he let Erica. And that day the ‘sad look’ was more a bit more pronounced. One of the popular girls—under guidance of their queen bee Lydia Martin, no doubt—had made some back handed comment to her in the girl’s locker room. She had huffed and tugged her sweats back on and fled to the sound of their laughter. By the time she reached the front of the school she was crying, half frustration half something else.

The tears had stopped a few blocks away, leaving the girl a sniffling mess as she walked down the sidewalk, trying to hurry to get home. She almost missed the sound of a pained cry for help when it came.

Instead she stopped, looking around for the source and clutching the straps of her backpack.

“Hello?” she called nervously. It was still daylight and she was on a popular road but something about that sound didn’t sit right with her. It made her stomach twisted and her heart jump.

The sound came again and she ducked into the bushes, spotting a ball of orange fur.

The cat was curled tight, its tail thick with bristling fear and it hissed when it saw her. Blood matted its stomach and a part of its paw, and despite all its hostile growling it didn’t seem able to move.

Erica scooped up the cat, thankful for her thick gym clothes to protect her from scratches and took the cat to the local vet.

Dr. Deaton cleaned the cat and wrapped its wound before looking at Erica with a raised eyebrow.

“Is she yours?” Erica sputtered for a moment, unsure if she should lie to the man about the cat. All she had said when she brought her in was that she had come home and found it hurt. “Ms. Reyes this is a no-kill shelter so if it’s not yours we can certainly keep her her—“

“No, it’s my cat.” She had finally found her voice, looking at the cat with wide eyes before back to the vet. “She’s mine.”

If Deaton saw through her lie he didn’t say anything, merely handed the teen some antibiotics and promised her they were on the house before offering her the cat in a vented cardboard box with paw prints across the side.

“Be sure to keep a better eye on your pets Ms. Reyes. You don’t want her getting out again.”

“I think I just forgot to close my window,” Erica lied again, glancing at the sedated animal. “I promise, I’ll take great care of her.”

“I don’t doubt that.”

Erica took the cat home and set it on her bed. She didn’t know the first thing about having a pet or what to do when they were injured. She could keep it in the bathroom for now—until she told her father—but she would need to pick up some supplies the next day.

The cat purred when she scratched it behind the ears and she decided to name her SK. She had forgotten about the girls at school and she let the cat sleep on her stomach that night.

The next day was Saturday and perfect for going shopping for a new pet. When she woke up SK was gone however. She looked around her room and down stairs until she found her father at the table.

“I took the cat to the vet. You don’t need a pet, Erica.”

Erica had screamed at him and cried for an hour. Afterward she ran over to Deaton’s demanded to see her cat. He explained the cat hadn’t been brought back. She cried again in the vet’s office and went home. Deaton had said maybe her father had taken it to a different shelter and he would ask around.

Still angry she gave her father the cold shoulder for the rest of the night. And when she brought the trash from her room down to the garbage pail outside she found a dark garbage bag there with orange fur sticking out from the edges.

She didn’t talk to her father for a week, didn’t tell him what she found.

Erica never picked up strays again.

-x-

The incident with the cat had been four long years ago. Since then she had left Beacon Hills behind, hoping to get away from her old school mates and ties at college. UCLA wasn’t too far from home but it was far enough that she hoped she could leave everyone behind. High school hadn’t been kind years. For the most part she was a pariah; the epileptic girl no one really wanted to give the time of day. By now her seizures were for the most part under control but she still separated herself from the rest. She didn’t bother with clubs, she didn’t bother with parties, she didn’t bother with friends. Her first roommate had ended up moving out second semester and left Erica to her own devices, tired of trying to get the girl to come out and do things, tired of hearing her crying when she though no one was around, tired of how Erica slept through most of the day. No one really wanted to bother. It was too much work and Erica hadn’t bothered giving back.

The few people she did end up talking to, oddly enough, were from her home town. While she had thought escaping was Beacon was the best for her she found more and more people had followed her in staying close but not close enough to home.

One project she had ended up pairing with Scott McCall, who had gone from athematic nice guy to Co-captain of the lacrosse team seemingly overnight in high school. To her surprise he still turned out to be the nice guy. He worked hard on the project with her and cast her worried looked every so often when she slipped back into her own mind. It was company at least.

One Thursday while they were working, Stiles Stilinski had found them in the library, tackling Scott from behind and causing a bit of scene. Erica tried not to blush at the sudden presence of her high school crush, burying herself in the book while the boys caught up but they eventually drew her into the conversation.

Stiles was visiting from Berkeley since their fall break was a bit longer and would be staying until Monday. He invited her to come out with them and gang (it almost sounded like he was about to say pack before Scott elbowed him in the ribs) from Beacon Hills. Apparently Isaac Lahey, Allison Argent, and Vernon Boyd were attending UCLA as well and Lydia had come down from Berkeley with him. Scott nodded happily when he finally got the words out, but Erica shied away, collecting her books.

“I think I’m just going to go to bed actually.” She insisted in a quiet voice. Both boys looked a bit disappointed, Scott leaning towards her slightly like approaching a wounded animal.

“Look they’re going to be here for a bit. Come hang out on the weekend or something?”

Erica smiled, biting the edge of her lip as she got to her feet, shaking her head. “No, really it’s okay.” She insisted before bolting from the library, tripping slightly as she did. She could hear people snickering behind her and something burned in her stomach saying that Stiles and Scott were probably too. They would probably go back and tell everyone else how Reyes was still a freak.

Erica Reyes would always be a freak.

By the time she got back to her room, her vision was blurry from tears.

-x-

The depression started in sophomore year. Around the same time as the cat. Or maybe it started when she was nine and her mother left. Or maybe when she was seven and had her first mild seizure and came to school the next day and was mocked for wetting herself.

It didn’t matter when it started because it didn’t go away.

Nineteen, half way through her first year of college and she was still falling apart.

She wanted to blame the meeting in the library. If she hadn’t been reminded of high school, she wouldn’t have slipped again. If she hadn’t tripped and been laughed at she would have been fine. But they were old excuses. In truth college was a distraction. The small conversations, the work load, the professors. All of it had merely been a thin layer of paint across her fucked up canvas. And now it was washing away and everything was spilling back.

She hated that something as small as that had been a catalyst. Hell it shouldn’t have been. It really wasn’t.

Erica hardly thought about the library when she walked out of the dorm room at two a.m. Saturday morning. She hardly remembered the run in and the mention of old friends as she walked down the streets, her hands stuffed in her sweatshirt pocket. She hardly remembered Thursday at all as she slipped under the caution tape guarding a construction zone near one of the college dives.

The real reason, she told herself as she climbed the stairs of the half built building, was because she didn’t need one. She had no reason to die. But she had no reason to live.

The building was mostly done from the outside and there was a sort of makeshift roof a few floors from the ground. It was sky scraper territory but it was enough that when she boosted herself through a glassless window, the ground looked tiny below her. It was high enough to get the job done.

A few sounds brought her from her thoughts for one moment.

Someone yelled Erica.

She didn’t know who and it didn’t really matter because she pushed off the wall and sailed towards the ground.

-x-

“BITE HER!”

“No. She’s not conscious so she can’t decide if she wants it.”

“She’ll die if you don’t!”

“…”

“Derek bite her!”

“Scott you didn’t like that it was forced on you!”

“I WASN’T BLEEDING OUT ON THE PAVEMENT!!”

“WHAT IF IT DOESN’T WORK?!”

“You’re scared you’re going to kill her?! SHE’S DYING NOW!”

“Don’t force him… Jeez someone just call 911.”

“Stiles, if he bites her, she’ll live and 911 won’t know what to do!”

“Her heartbeat is getting weaker.”

“DEREK!”

“I… What if she doesn’t want it?”

“You’re not Peter. We all know that. We’ll just call 911.”

“She won’t make it.”

 “Please Derek.” The last voice was closest to her and she blinked slowly, her vision blocked by blonde and blonde hair. It was dark and she was on the ground, surrounded by a group of people. “Or she’ll die.”

Erica’s mouth curled up at the edges, teeth bloody and cracked. _‘It’s fine.’_ She wanted to say _. ‘I want to die. I wouldn’t have jumped if I didn’t want to. It’s really okay.’_ The only sound that came out was a gurgle of blood caught in her throat.

“She’s not going to make it.” They sounded resigned. Erica Reyes was really going to die at nineteen, choking on her own blood on the pavement.

Suddenly she was scared. It hit her hard, making her breath come out panicked. The pain was starting to register in her mind and her limbs cried out in the broken mess. For all her courage—she wasn’t ready now. She was scared. She wanted her dad. She wanted her mom. She didn’t want to—

“Please.” This voice was her own.

“Do it!”

The last thing Erica remembered before blacking out again was a pair of red eyes.

-x-

She was dreaming.

Erica was dreaming that she was eight again, sitting on her mother’s lap on the backyard porch swing. Her mother hummed quietly as she stroked her blonde hair and Erica watched her father at the grill.

She was dreaming and everything was bright and warm.

And then she woke up.

-x-

Erica sat up with a howl of pain, fingers stretching into something sharp and teeth growing past her lips. She kicked and fought against the blankets, tearing them as she did and knocking a lamp over. Her body was hot with pain and she kicked and screamed.

Someone grabbed her ankles, holding her feet to the mattress as someone pushed her shoulders back into the bed.

“NO!” She yelled, fighting furiously against the two. She could swear she felt claws digging into her skin and it only made her panic more. She tried to lunge forward again, trying to get away. A door opened and more people walked into the room. “GET AWAY.”

There was a growl and the same flash of red and she was brought down once again, whimpering like a dog. She hated the sounds spilling from her mouth but she couldn’t help it. Instead she curled back up.

“It’s okay Erica, you’re okay.” Someone was stroking her hair and a woman’s voice was speaking to her. “You’re going to be okay. Just sleep okay?”

So she did.

-x-

The next time she woke up it was like being hung over. Her body was heavy with tiredness, her mouth dry and her head pounding. The cars outside were loud and there was thumping in her room. She blinked past her exhaustion and looked around, spotting someone passed out, head on her thighs. Red hair was spilling around the person and realization hit her.

She let out a growl.

Within seconds the room was full of people again, Lydia dragged back out of reach of Erica looking half asleep as she stood next to another girl.

“What are yo—“ She tried but was cut off by a taller man in a leather jacket.

“Lydia you fell asleep!?”

“For a second.” She huffed, flipping her hair over her shoulder like she had done nothing wrong. “Unlike some people I used my watch time for studying, while sleeping beauty drooled away. I must have dozed off for a second. If you were so worried you should have been watching.”

“Lydia, you really should have come got me if you were tired,”

They were all talking like Erica wasn’t in the room, wasn’t sitting in the bed staring at the freak show now assembled in her dorm room.

Except…

It wasn’t her dorm.

Panic rose and claws slipped forward from her hands again. “Where am I?”

“Allison, Lydia, Stiles. Out.”

“Kicking the humans out, isn’t that a little speciesis—“

“Go!”

Three bodies left the room and a still panicked Erica catalouged who was left.

The man in the leather jacket, who had flashed red eyes when he first stormed in was standing closest to her, looking ready to jump if she made one wrong move. His body language was tense and it made her shrink back into the bed, pulling the covers closer to herself. They smelled vaguely of leather and the man but for some reason it calmed her deep down, despite his intimidating appearance.

Two other males stood at the end of the bed, one with golden curls, shifting from foot to foot with anxiety and the other  a dark skinned man, arms crossed as well and looking at anywhere but her.

The last was—

“Scott?”

Scott McCall smiled softly, looking almost guilty as he watched her. “Hey Erica. You remember I told you Isaac and Boyd went to school with us?” He pointed at the other two and as he named them.

“So you kidnapped me because I didn’t go out for drinks with you?” She mumbled. Scott blinked and Isaac laughed. The other two remained looking oddly stiff.

“What do you remember?” It was the man again, leaning in as he spoke. Erica shrunk further back against the wall.

“Derek give her space,” The one called Isaac sighed. Derek didn’t listen however. Instead he waited for Erica to speak.

“I went for a walk on Saturday…” She paused. She was going to kill herself that night. She didn’t want them to know. She didn’t want to be here. This wasn’t—

“We found you.” Derek was speaking again, leaning back finally and picking something up from where it had been knocked on the floor. It was a pile of girl’s clothing. Not her own by the style. He offered them out to Erica who blinked before looking down at the tee-shirt she was clad in. Also not her own. She snatched the clothes from him, coloring as she held them over her chest.

“YOU UNDRESSED ME?!”

“Your clothing was bloody.” It was the other man, Boyd, who spoke. His voice was calm and unreadable, his stare heavy on her as he spoke. “You jumped from a building and tried to kill yourself.”

“We found you,” Derek cut in again, repeating his words. “And helped you.”

“How?”

“What do you know about werewolves?”

-x-

The explanation did not go well.

They got maybe five sentences out before Erica jumped from the bed, standing on the mattress, eyes golden and claws elongated.

“WHAT THE FUCK DID YOU DO?!”

“You’re a werewolf now.”

“WHY?”

“It was the only way to save you.” Derek sounded tired and guilty, refusing to look at her and not dodging as she lunged at him, smacking him and accidently clawing the skin of his cheek. She watched in horror as the wound knitted itself back together. Erica Screamed.

It was enough however for Derek to leave the room, Scott running after him and yelling about explaining since he was an alpha. They argued into the hallway of… where ever and Erica could still here them.

“You all are freaks!” She snapped back at Isaac and Boyd, the only two left in the room. “And now I’m a fucking monster just like you!”

“You were going to die,” Isaac looked torn, eyes bright like he might cry but face set with anger. Boyd remained quiet.

“AND? WHY ELSE DO PEOPLE JUMP FROM BUILDINGS IF THEY DON’T WANT TO DIE?!”

“We… we wanted to save you…”

“So what now?” She laughed manically, throwing her hands up in the air. “Do you want a fucking medal!? Should I get on my fucking knees because you and your _pack_ ” she spit the word like it was venom “Saved my life? Fuck you! Fuck you all.” Tears were spilling hot from her face as she snapped, hopping off the bed and backing Isaac into a wall. “Do you want me to fucking preen and worship you all because you picked up a broken girl from the street and put her back together. You know nothing about me! You had no right to save me! You had no right—“

Someone grabbed her around the waist—Boyd she assumed because he was the only one left—and ripped her away from Isaac. She kicked wildly as he threw her back on the mattress, eyes flashing and teeth pointed.

“You wanted to be saved Erica,” He growled, the first bit of emotion finally bleeding into his voice. “You cried for help and that’s how we found you. You asked to be saved. You may not remember but you didn’t want to die and we weren’t going to let you. You should be thankful to Derek not throwing a fucking fit.” He stepped back; panting slightly like it was the most he’d said in years. Erica blinked at him, propping herself up.

“I hate you.” She hissed. “I hate you all.”

-x-

The next few hours went quietly. For all Erica knew they could have been days. She changed into the clothes Derek had offered, sniffing them a bit as she put them on. A few minutes later Allison reentered the room, smelling almost exactly the same.

“They wanted you to wear some of Boyd’s or Isaac’s. I said mine would fit you better.” She said, extending a plate of food like it was a peace offering.

“Why?” Erica asked, giving the food a glare before her stomach growling in resistance. Allison laughed and Erica’s growl hardened.

“It’s a pack thing,” she said like it would explain everything. “But uh… They could explain it better than me.”

“Yeah? Why’s that?”

“I’m human,” She said setting the food down for Erica.

“I was too.”

-x-

Derek and Scott came back a bit after Allison, followed—despite the protest she had overheard—but Stiles. Erica leaned back against the wall, blinking up at the ceiling as they stared.

“Can you explain?” She asked, not look at any of them. “Please…”

-x-

Werewolves apparently were common. Derek came from a family of them. A family that was destroyed by hunters who turned out to be Allison’s family (Yeah, Erica wasn’t touching that with a ten foot pole). Scott was turned in high school by Derek’s psychotic uncle and was killed. Derek became the alpha and bit Isaac, Jackson, and Boyd to form his pack. And then Peter came back and then a pack of alphas and evil druids and so much more that just left her head spinning.

She listened the entire time however, nodding where she felt she needed and forcing herself to laugh at Stiles’ added on jokes.

They all seemed tense (smelled nervous) but as far as Erica could tell… that was it.

Now she was one of them. She was pack if she wanted to be and would always have a place if she wanted it.

Her eyes began to water and they left the room.

-x-

This time she was almost certain it was night when she woke up. The room was darker than it had been before and the only sound other than her own breathing and heart beat was the muffled sound of the others through the door.

The same faint scent on the sheets was in the room as well. She sat up and rubbed her eyes before taking a shot in the dark (literally) and calling “Derek?”

The lamp flicked on on the other side of the room and Derek raised an eyebrow, watching her thoughtfully.

“You know that’s like Twilight levels of creepy.” She muttered and to her surprise Derek laughed.

“Stiles said the same thing,”

“Seems like he could be the Batman to my Catwoman,” Erica replied with a serious nod, smiling faintly despite herself. Derek seemed to relax a bit.

“I didn’t want you to wake up alone again and freak out.”

“Thanks.” She muttered and he nodded in reply. It didn’t seem like enough however. So she cleared her throat and tried again. “Thank you. For everything. For saving me and for letting me be pack. Thank you.”

Derek blinked at her, not hiding the shock on his face for a second. He did cough into the back of hand covering up the emotion and shrugging lightly. “It was a pack decision. No one wanted to see you die.”

“Yeah I bet it was gruesome.”

“No,” He said, getting to his feet. “I meant no one wanted you to die, period.”

-x-

It took a couple of weeks for Erica to feel comfortable with the pack.

She went back to school the day after her and Derek’s last talk, everyone’s numbers now programmed in her phone. She went back to her regular routine of being alone.

It took two days before they found her.

Scott was the first to come knocking at her door, panicking about their class project that had to be finished and ushering her to the library. They pulled an all-nighter and got a B-. Erica wasn’t even disappointed when she saw how happy Scott was with his grade.

Allison and Lydia stormed into her room a couple of days later, dragging her out of her room and towards the mall, Lydia demanding that Erica update her wardrobe as fast as possible. They marched her in and out various stores, Lydia demanding her try on most of everything and complimenting her on her curvy figure and height. Allison beamed and nodded as she came out in each new outfit. Her father called her surprised the next day asking why she had spent so much money and when she said she went shopping with friends he merely hummed happily and asked if she still wanted to come home for Christmas.

Isaac she met at one of the campus coffee shops, laughing loudly as he choked on his drink when she apologized for yelling him. She hugged him when she left a few hours later and they set up a daily coffee date.

Boyd sat next to her in the library while she was studying one night for a test and she couldn’t find the words to say to him. Instead they studied in silence. Erica dozed off around three a.m. and when she woke up thirty minutes later Boyd was still leafing through a text book but had draped his jacket around her shoulders.

When the full moon approached Isaac was the one to pick her up the morning before and they drove out to Beacon Hills. She stopped by to say hello to her dad and introduce him to Isaac and Boyd (who they picked up on the way) before heading over to the old Hale house. It was rebuilt now and the front lawn was scattered with people.

Scott, Allison, Lydia, Stiles, and Derek all greeted them warmly when they got out of the car and Erica was introduced to Cora—who was still a senior and Derek’s sister. They spoke and within minutes Erica was sure she had found partner in crime (well, that was what Stiles called them as they gossiped in hushed tones).

When night rolled around the wolves took off running and Erica jogged along slowly. She had never been much of a runner and the way they took off together, laughing and playing around, it felt too personal for her. That was until Isaac tackled her to the ground, causing a playful tussle.

That night she didn’t even protest when they all passed out, muddy on the front porch.

It still took a few weeks for Erica to feel like she belonged but for once she held her head up. She smiled and she meant it. The whole pack was a bunch of misfits. A bunch of strays that had been picked up along the way.

And with them, she finally felt at home.

**Author's Note:**

> The suicide attempt and suicidal thought tags are both very serious. This story contains a lot of depression, suicidal idealization and a character attempts suicide by jumping from a building, and almost succeeds. If this is going to be triggering please don't read.
> 
> Also I'm on the [tumblr](http://ohno-w0lves.tumblr.com/)


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